Apple’s rumored triple-lens iPhone, allegedly coming in 2019, may bring 3x optical zoom and advanced 3D sensing via stereoscopic vision, one analyst speculated Tuesday.
That’s according to a research note from Deutsche Securities analyst Jialin Lu, mentioned in a Tuesday report from Taiwanese publication Economic Daily News (Google Translate).
At least one of the phones scheduled for release in 2019 is, according to the machine-translated article, “expected to have twelve million pixels 6P anti-shock specifications.” Among other perks, a 6P lens provides true optical zoom and light field camera applications.
The news outlet first mentioned a triple-lens iPhone last month. Having three lenses out the back would result in crisper long-exposure shots, better images in low-light conditions, as well as improved depth detection, portraiture photography and depth of field effects.
Bloomberg was first to report last November that Apple would release a triple-lens iPhone model in 2019 with enhanced augmented reality features, such as accurate depth mapping and more reliable tracking, thanks to vastly improved 3D sensing.
As the Cupertino technology giant is expected to keep iPhone X’s TrueDepth camera system, future iPhone models will likely sport both front and rear-facing 3D sensing capabilities.
Having three 12-megapixel lenses will power new photography and camera features, Lu speculated, like stereoscopic vision and 3x optical zoom capabilities on an iPhone for the first time thanks to a longer focal length without a reduction in quality like digital zoom.
For the comparison’s sake, Apple’s existing dual-lens smartphone models—iPhone 7 Plus, iPhone 8 Plus and iPhone X—feature 2x optical zoom.
iPhone won’t be the first smartphone with three lenses on the back, though.
That honor belongs to Huawei’s recently released P20 Pro device which comes outfitted with a triple-lens rear camera system comprised of a 40-megapixel lens, a 20-megapixel monochrome lens and an eight-megapixel telephoto lens with 3x optical zoom.